Child vehicle seat with improved mounting system

ABSTRACT

A child&#39;s vehicle seat with an improved mounting system ( 1 ), where a seat belt ( 2 ) is employed for attaching a child&#39;s seat. A first portion ( 3 ) of the seat belt is positioned substantially horizontally over a forwardly facing portion of the child seat&#39;s backrest ( 4 ). The child seat&#39;s backrest ( 4 ) has receiving portions for receiving the seat belt&#39;s first portion ( 3 ). The mounting system is further characterised in that a second portion ( 5 ) of the seat belt is positioned substantially horizontally over or under a forwardly facing part of the child seat&#39;s sitting portion ( 6 ).

The present invention relates to a mounting system for attaching achild's seat in a car and an adjustment device for adjusting the childseat's safety harness.

One of the most crucial safety factors when transporting children by caris the attachment of the child's seat to the car seat. There arecurrently a number of different ways of implementing this attachment.Many of these attachment methods involve operational steps that are feltby the user to be unnecessarily complicated. Many of the knownattachment devices also have the potential for improvement purely fromthe safety point of view.

During user tests of child's seats it has been shown that the attachmentof the child's scat to the car seat is carried out incorrectly in agreat many cases, and this misuse results in a reduction in safety. Itis therefore an object of the invention to provide a simple method ofattaching a child's seat to the car seat that is easy to check, so thatit is easy for the user to ascertain whether the child's seat iscorrectly attached.

Various types of solutions are previously known for attaching a child'sseat to the car seat both by means of an attachment procedure involvingthe seat belt in the car and by the use of separate mechanisms forattachment to the car seat.

The use is known of a number of different types of mechanisms forattaching the rear of the child's seat to the car seat. The rear of thechild's seat may, for example, be provided with loop devices formounting to the car seat. However, this is a highly impractical andcumbersome method of attaching the seat. When using devices that aremounted to the rear of the child's seat it is also difficult to checkwhether the child's seat is actually correctly attached.

In other known systems use is made of the actual seat belt, which isnormally used by adult passengers, to mount the child's seat.

In publication DE 3703742 an example is disclosed of attachment of achild's seat by means of the seat belt. In this case the seat belt isfastened over the child's seat with a portion diagonally over thechild's seat and the other portion horizontally over the central portionof the child's seat. In this system the seat belt serves two purposes;both to keep the child's seat in place in the car seat and to contributetowards strapping the child in safely. The system does not worksatisfactorily from the safety point of view, since the child is notstrapped into the child's seat by a five-point belt, but only kept inplace by a horizontal barrier in addition to a part of the seat belt'sdiagonal portion.

When using child's seats, however, it may sometimes also be necessary toadjust the attachment of the child's safety harness to the child seat'sbackrest in relation to the child's shoulder height in a sittingposition. This is an adjustment that is necessary when the child hasgrown or if the child's seat is used by several children of differentsizes.

It is known in the prior art for the child's safety harness to be fixedto the backrest in through-going openings provided in the backrest. Whenthe child's safety harness has to be adjusted with regard to heightaccording to the prior art, the safety harness has to be removed fromthe opening concerned and reinserted through other openings in thebackrest. This is a time-consuming method of adjusting the safetyharness, and is manifestly far from user-friendly.

The present-day requirement for child's seats is that the forwardmovement to which the child should be exposed during braking should belimited to 55 cm. Tests have shown that by means of the presentinvention this distance is reduced to 48 cm. By means of the attachmentsystem according to the present invention the remaining 7 cm can beexploited during braking, thus reducing the possibility of the childbeing subjected to severe forces and stresses in the neck and head area.

The attachment system according to the invention will be felt to beuser-friendly since all the attachment of the child's seat is carriedout in a simple manner on the front of the child's seat. Compared withknown attachment systems where the actual attachment takes place at theback of the child's seat, this method of mounting the child's seat willbe perceived as easy to perform. In addition it is an advantage that itis easy to ensure that the child's seat is actually secured, since onlya glance is required to check whether the child's seat is secured by theseat belt.

The mounting system for the child's seat according to a preferredembodiment of the invention employs the car's three-point seat belts.The child's seat is placed in the car seat and the seat belt is over thechild seat's with a first portion of the seat belt being positionedhorizontally over the forwardly facing back support surface of thechild's seat's backrest. A second portion of the seat belt is placedbelow the child seat's sitting portion, in contact with the frontsurface of a base on which the seat is mounted.

In a second application of the child's seat the seat belt located in themiddle of the back seat can be placed below the child seat's sittingportion, while an extra harness or other suitable means is employed toensure that the child seat's backrest is secured in a similar manner tothat which is achieved by means of a three-point seat belt.

The child's seat may have different arrangements or devices to securethe seat belt in the above-mentioned horizontal positions.

For securing a first portion of the seat belt, in a preferred embodimentthe child seat's backrest has L-shaped slots in the backrest's sideportions. The seat belt is passed through the slot's opening until thewidth of the seat belt fills the lowest part of the slot and the seatbelt achieves a horizontal positioning over the backrest. By means ofthis method of attaching the seat belt to the backrest, the object isachieved that the seat belt is placed approximately on a level with thepart of the backrest that is closest to the car seat. By positioning theseat belt in this fashion, a stable and uniform attachment is achievedrelative to the car seat. If the car seat belt is used in addition forattaching the child's seat, which is arranged so as to beself-tightening, the forward movement of the child's seat will bereduced to a minimum.

It may also be appropriate to have different designs for portions of theside supports for attaching the seat belt, such as cut-outs with a widthcorresponding to the width of the seat belt where the seat belt can belocated and secured by, for example, articulated locking devices. Thereare a great many possibilities here with regard to different methods ofpositioning and securing the seat belt. It is therefore left to thosewho are skilled in the art to decide which design or device is bestsuited to the attachment of the seat belt to the backrest in eachindividual case.

In a preferred embodiment the seat belt's second portion is kept inposition under the child scat's sitting portion by the seat belt beingstretched over the child seat's base in the horizontal position.According to a preferred embodiment of the invention the base will slantinwards, while the sitting portion projects slightly out over the base,thereby forming a natural stopper for the seat belt's second portion. Inthose cases where the sitting portion does not project out over the baseor if extra attachment devices are required for safety reasons, thesecan easily be attached to the base of the child's seat. The necessityfor attachment devices is a matter to be decided by the expert in eachindividual case and several types of design of such attachment devicescan be envisaged. It may also be appropriate to equip the base with agroove or a cutout that secures the second portion of the seat belt inthe desired horizontal position.

For adjusting the child's safety harness the child seat's backrest isprovided with through-going cutouts extending in the backrest'slongitudinal direction and with a width corresponding substantially tothe width of the child seat's safety harness. In an embodiment of theinvention, the cutouts at the front of the backrest are covered byflexible cloth material, possibly with slots marking the adjustmentdevice's fixed locking positions.

The rear of the child seat's backrest is designed with at least twoprojecting portions where in each portion there are provided respectivelocking grooves. The adjustment device is mounted between the projectingportions. According to a preferred embodiment of the invention theadjustment device may be equipped with lead devices, which are arrangedin engagement with the projecting portions' locking grooves and whichcan be moved along them. The locking grooves may be designed in such amanner that there are individual portions of the locking grooves wherethe adjustment device can be securely locked preferably by means of itslead devices, or alternatively the locking grooves may be arranged insuch a manner that the adjustment device can be securely locked alongthe entire length of the locking groove. This may be achieved, forexample, by the portions that are arranged for locking being placed atshort intervals or the locking groove being provided as a rail. The usemay also be envisaged of VELCRO hook-and-loop fastener for locking theadjustment device in a fixed position.

According to the invention the adjustment device is designed with asupport portion for the child's safety harnesses and a gripping portionthat is used when moving the adjustment device in the locking grooves.The child's safety harnesses are passed through the backrest'sthrough-going cut-outs and are passed on over the adjustment device'ssupport portion, before the safety harness is passed on along thebackrest and on towards the child seat's sitting portion.

When the safety harness's height over the child's shoulders has to beadjusted, only a simple movement is required to take hold of theadjustment device's gripping portion. The adjustment device is moved upor down the locking groove until the desired height is reached,whereupon the adjustment device is locked in the desired position in thelocking groove.

The gripping portion may assume different forms and the gripping portionillustrated in the attached drawings is only an example of a type ofdesign.

The adjustment device according to a preferred embodiment of theinvention is designed in such a manner that the position/height of boththe safety harnesses resting over the child's shoulder portion areadjusted simultaneously. If so desired, it will be possible to employthe adjustment device according to the invention for separate adjustmentof the height of each of the safety harnesses.

The invention will now be described in greater detail with reference tothe attached figures.

FIG. 1 is a perspective view of a child's seat illustrated attached bymeans of a three-point seat belt.

FIG. 2 is a perspective view of a second embodiment of the invention.

In the figure a child's seat 1 is illustrated that has to be employedduring transport of a child by car. The child's seat 1 is placed in thecar seat (not illustrated in the figure) either in front or back seatsand a seat belt preferably of the three-point type is arranged over thefront of the child's seat, as illustrated in FIG. 1.

In this fastened position a first portion 3 of the seat belt will extendsubstantially horizontally positioned over the child seat's backrest 4.As the figure illustrates, an attempt will be made to arrange the seatbelt's 2 first portion 3 along a portion of the backrest's bottom 4′ inorder to obtain a uniform and stable attachment against the car seat. Iffor various reasons it proves to be difficult to arrange the seat belt's2 first portion 3 in contact with the backrest's bottom 4′, the firstportion 3 is arranged as horizontally as possible over the child seat'sbackrest 4, but in this case often at a greater distance from the carseat.

In FIG. 1 receiving portions are illustrated intended for receiving thefirst portion 3 of the seat belt. These receiving portions may be in theform of L-shaped slots 8 in the child seat's 1 side portion 7 asillustrated in the figure. The first portion 3 of the seat belt 2 caneasily be inserted into the slot 8 and brought into substantiallyhorizontally positioned abutment along the bottom 4 of the child seat'sbackrest 4.

When the child's seat is secured by the seat belt 2, in a preferredembodiment the seat belt's second portion 5 is arranged below the childseat's sitting portion 6. The second portion 5 of the seat belt 2 willpreferably extend substantially horizontally positioned over the base 11of the child's seat.

In a second embodiment of the invention the seat belt's second portion 5may extend substantially horizontally positioned over the child seat'ssitting portion 6, preferably over the lower area of the child seat'ssitting portion 6. In the embodiment, the child seat's sitting portion 6may be equipped with suitable arrangements or devices for receiving theseat belt's 2 second portion 5.

1. A child vehicle seat for attachment in a vehicle having a three-pointseat belt, comprising a. a backrest having a forwardly-facing backsupport surface, said backrest further comprising two side supportsmembers that project forward from edges of the back rest, b. a sittingportion affixed to a base having a forward facing surface, said sittingportion having a front end that extends beyond the forward facingsurface of the base, and c. an L-shaped slot arranged in each of theside support members, such that one leg of the L-shaped slot extendsfrom the forward perimeter of its respective side support member to thelevel of the surface of the forwardly-facing back support surface, andfurther such that the other leg of the L-shaped slot extends downwardtoward the sitting portion, whereby a first portion of the three-pointseatbelt can engage each of the L-shaped slots and a second portion ofthe three-point seatbelt can be arranged against the forward facingsurface of the base under the front end of the sitting portion.
 2. Achild vehicle seat according to claim 1, wherein the forward facingsurface of the base slants back in the direction of the back rest.
 3. Achild vehicle seat according to claim 2 wherein the forward facingsurface of the base is provided with a groove for receiving the secondportion of the seatbelt.